The Screw of the Tern

By William Melville and Desmond Scott

In the far-off 1960s, Will Melville was one of those young guys who flunked out of college and had a hard time choosing between military service in Vietnam and leaving the country. As he said in the beginning, When the lights came on, I knew I was in the dark.

• Language: English
• Publisher: iUniverse
• Release date: Jun 22, 2015
• ISBN: 9781491768440

William Melville

Desmond Scott Rubinstein (pictured) was a prolific ghostwriter for Brown & Shue in the early 1970s. He graciously edited my father’s diary of his brief adventure on the yacht, the Tern. As mentioned in the story, they met by accident at the museum of art shortly before Scott’s untimely death in 1974. My dad said he always intended to publish Scott’s manuscript, but persistent health issues got in the way. I actually never saw the manuscript until a few months ago when his son, Aaron Rubinstein, called me from his hospital bed at Sloan-Kettering and told me the final draft was in an empty cookie tin in the tree house of an old live oak where he used to live. He also told me that my grand-uncle, Captain Robert Melville, whom I never had the chance to meet, died in a plane crash in October 2001. Thanks to the great professional assistance of the entire iUniverse staff, I have been able to honor the short life-long friendship of my father and Mr. Rubinstein. I’m sure they’re still the best of friends. Christopher Melville (July 2014)

Book preview

CHAPTER 1

When the lights came on, I knew I was in the dark. I must have dozed off. For a few moments, I wasn’t sure who or where I was. Turning toward the window, a face came into view and I regained my identity—ephemeral as it was—but then my next breath obscured my image. I travelled—you might say tunnelled like a mole-rat—through 1300 miles and 28 hours, leaving the tiny, bright, cheerful mammary warmth of my mother’s kitchen in Monroe, Michigan, for an odyssey that so far revealed no end in light. Not a scintilla, except the dim row of lights above the seats which indicated I was going nowhere fast in spite of the dreamy arc of a torn and faded PanAm banner for Paris in springtime running out of reach overhead.

All right, boys and girls. There it is. Fort Lauderdale, said the driver as he glided the bus into the station and snapped on the overhead lights. He turned up the speaker volume for the benefit of those still asleep in the back rows, not to mention the groans of insemination two rows behind me. End of the line, boys and girls. This is it. There ain’t no more. Your bags will be meeting you on the curb. Although we earlier struck up an acquaintance on the long journey, he still shot a glance at me. You, too, buddy.

He must have popped another little white pill as we came into the station. What else would explain why he added with cheer we could choose beaches: the one three blocks away, or 150 miles to the west, and he threw his arm out in the direction of St. Pete with the enthusiasm of a field judge. Somewhere after Murfreesboro, he went on auto-pilot and said I can’t talk now. Maybe later. With nary a twitch, he sailed through the next six hours, arms moving with an unnerving mechanical slouch toward unconsciousness; humming the same tune over and over. As we trundled across an abandoned railroad trestle in southern Georgia, he started grunting the gospel, Deep River.

I finally put in a few good hours of soundless sleep and became, as I said, disoriented at the abrupt announcement. Where was Fort Lauderdale, other than on a map where it always was? Then it came back to me: leaving home and not quite knowing where to go or who to turn to, save for a phone number on a scrap of paper.

The driver’s name was Jake Poussy. I still don’t know why I then remembered his name. Maybe because he said P-O-U-S-S-Y with an o. Maybe because he was the only person I talked to on the long desperate trip. I knew I would forget his name the minute I left the terminal. A pelt-like walrus mustache draped over his lips made his small oval mouth look like something anatomically out of place.³ He chatted with the last knot of stragglers ahead of me. You people must be futilistic, getting away from something worse than Helen who is coming up the coast in two days. Packing one hundred thirty miles per hour. She will definitely knock on some doors. He grabbed the arm of the kid in front of me and said, Joe Bob you and Cissy had best not made a mess on my seats back there.

I was first on the bus and the last to get off. Jake blew a big gum bubble, sucked it back in and said he enjoyed chatting along the sinuous pilgrimmage from Monroe. For every bone-rattling hundred miles, the bus seemed to backtrack every fifty like an aimless dung beetle according to some crackpot business model to maximize both passenger miles and the agony of those too poor to fly. I knew enough calculus to figure I’d never get to Florida in my lifetime, but I even flunked that quiz. He tilted his pilot cap, brushed off the frayed, embroidered wings on the shoulders and said it would be a lot easier in my situation to take the Trailways over to Windsor and up to Toronto. I told him someone paid for my ticket.

Yeah, and my gung-ho grandson’s chasing gooks in the Delta over there. Don’t want to go there, pal. He’s crazy, but I love him to death.

Not sure what you mean, I said slipping into my backpack.

I was on Tarawa. Ever heard of it? He flinched when he said, Tarawa.

Pacific campaign?

Bingo! You know some stuff, pal. You don’t ever want to go there. Still keeps the old lady up at night. He threw a quick salute with two fingers and limped off into the terminal. The old vet must have sized me up pretty well: one of many young guys working on the 30-day drill before Army greetings hit the mailbox.

I cinched the bulging backpack and followed in the wake of the driver’s limp into the crowded bus terminal. It brought back memories of the monkey house at Lincoln Park. The long hard drive must have kicked up Jake’s sciatica, which he detailed to me somewhere between Atlanta and Dothan, but he didn’t complain other than to lean against the tiled terminal wall every thirty feet or so.⁴

I sat at a table with trash, the walking dead and my hot dog and Fresca. I noticed a few loose girls waiting in line for tickets and tried to knot together the unravelling events of the last day. Mother was saddened and speechless when I told her I committed academic hari-kiri. What a gut-wrenching mess!⁵

Will, no! Not again! she uttered as the Dean’s notice fluttered from her wet hands.

Sorry, Mom.

She put a hand to her cheek. I could see she wanted so much to suspend her despair and hope it was from one of the romance novels she enjoyed skimming through. But it was the second time in three years. I double-down screwed up. She reached across the faux blue marblized formica kitchen table and took my hand. It smelled of garlic and was warmer, more confiding and comforting than her dutch apple pie with a dollop of French vanilla ice cream.

But Will, you promised me you would make it this time. What happened? She glanced around the kitchen. There was blood on the band-aid around her right thumb. Why didn’t you ask for help?

I thought of sarcasting that I was sorry for two-timing her, flunking out again, but there was no need to bring Freud to the table. There was already enough trouble lining up some of my girlfriends by then. When she asked at the screen door what I planned to do now, it cut me hard at the knees to reflect on the old acned adolescent refrain: what do you want to do when you grow up? At 21, I wasn’t mature enough to give an adequate answer to a question bouncing off many a kitchen table back then. Some of my friends also took a mysterious scholastic dive for no greater love—or a saccharine equivalent.

Mom dried her hands with a damp dishtowel and caressed my cheek with the generous cup of her right one as she walked past me into the living room. I felt terrible for her; for what I did to her; to not ease the pain she endured for me. She stood before the fireplace mantel where resided the framed photograph of her father-in-law (William Captain Billy Melville); her mother (Bernadette nee Arnold), and her husband (George Melville). They were all there looking back at her with a smile or raised eyebrow; especially Captain Billy. He went down with his troop ship in the Atlantic, where he shouldn’t have been but was for once with honor: the old rascal with the blue of the Caribbean Sea in his eyes. George, the father from heaven I never knew, died in Schwetzingen in 1945; immaculate with his medals; confident in his gaze with a sensuous mouth ever ready to say I’ll be home soon. He was away more than he would know. Bernadette, her diminutive mother, the New Orleans chorus girl with the dancing eyes now quiet and sitting this one out. I put my arm around her shoulder. She didn’t have to bring them into this, as I knew she would, standing there quietly beseeching counsel from a mute tryptich of timeless compassion.

Come on, Mom. Why don’t we sit down. I tugged at her arm.

Tell me about it, Will. How it happened. I need to know.

I dared not tell her the Dean’s generous offer to transfer me to Kretschmer Aeronautical Institute, which I already declined in my mind. Later, Mom.

When I alibied to the gruff Dean of the Lower Realm how I lost focus, he leaned back in his heavy oak chair against a neat phalanx of classics and became unbound; ran a hand with the fussy delicacy of a woman through his ratty hairpiece and expectorated with open arms, What are you trying to say? You’re another paper asshole? Why do you come to me now?

I was hot under the collar from embarrassment.

Look, William; you’re so close, so close, close, close to graduating. He gradually moved his thumb and middle finger together as he said this until they snapped with a pop. But no one on this burnt cinder is going to carry you across the finish line. It’s up to you, understand?

I wiped the sweat beads off my forehead with a small handkerchief. He then inspired like a pearl diver, held it in like a chain smoker and said with surprising bipolar contrition, "Listen, I’d like to help you finish up—but not here. I can get you transferred over to RIP near Euclid.⁶ It’s the best I can do. Take it!"

I leaned forward and almost waited for him to hand me a pastrami and provolone on pumpernickel over the deli case.

I’ve already sent five of your classmates over there. He gazed past his wife’s neglected spider plant out the small barred window. "You know, with this war junk going on, sometimes I feel like I’m in Budapest fixing passports for Jews escaping Nazis.

I didn’t know what to say about his offer, although the illusion frightened me with his ability to free-climb around history and academic advising. He swivelled back around and formed a nave with his nine fingers through which he peeked at a family photo on the desk.

So, I guess you’re ready to blow this joint, are you?

I heard he had a Ph.D in Medieval Techniques from Middlebury, but his words and tenor bristled with the anger of a dumbed-down, low-brow street-wise lingoist.

Professor Bernstein, I’m very sorry. I’m burned out. I already turned down one offer.

You got choices? Tell me about it! Holy Jehovah! You got nichts! Do you want to wind up like hamburger?

I shrugged my shoulders, a poor substitute for an exclamation mark, the point of which was my head.

You look like a roach, you know, he said. Down to the last drag. You must feel like what’s his name? Krapp? Krupp? Krips? Kafka!

I don’t know.

Well, think about the offer and let me know tomorrow, K?

I couldn’t even offer a token response. I wasn’t sure what the hell he rambled on about.

Take care, now. His charity gladdened my heart, even if his smile seemed like the gratuitous pokerface of the juvenile court judge who let me off when I was twelve for stealing hubcaps. We shook hands again and I walked out, brushing shoulders with the next flunk-out artist seeking clemency.

Mom’s voice came back. Will, I wish your father could have been here all these years to guide you. She stared out the window and I could see in the sunlight the slightest well of a tear filming her eyes like dew on a rose petal.

I know, Mom. I love you. I went over and held her for a moment until the tea kettle whistled on the stove.

CHAPTER 2

The crumpled match cover I fumbled in my hand had my Uncle Rob’s local phone number on it. With the backpack pushed under the seat in the telephone booth, I closed the folding door. Everything was greasy: the cradle, the hook, speaker, dialer. Like I entered a giant French fry.

Melville Associates.

Hello. This is William Melville, Mr. Melville’s nephew from Monroe. Can you hear me?

Yes. We’re expecting you. Where are you now?

I’m at the bus terminal. Hold on. I could see McDonald’s, Frank’s Franks, Speed’s Burger Palace, Luciano Pizza all in a clumped row of competing signage down the street. It could have been any town, but it was here in Fort Lauderdale and I was in a pickle. I wished I had been anybody else at that moment, anywhere, slinging burgers, throwing pizzas and wiping tables and taking abuse from drunks and red-eyed truckers. Leaning over the counter to get a girl’s phone number. But I was here. And I wondered about all those towns and intersections I passed through in the past year, incomplete and out-of-bounds now like the footballs I used to throw on Saturday afternoons with the Bronowski twins. Who jaywalked those streets now?⁷

Hey, Will. How are you? came a voice on the line I thought I knew.

Great, Uncle Rob. I really appreciate your helping me out here.

Oh, no problem. Glad to help out. So you’re finally here, eh?

Yeah. A real long trip. I’m exhausted.

Well, hang in there. We’ll pick you up at the terminal in ten minutes. By the way, how’s your mom doing?

I said she’s doing fine considering the stress of losing her son due to the collusion between exam blue books and skirt-chasing at Mundane. Yes, she fondly recalled a family get-together a few years ago in Cannonsburg. I was only five years old at the time. She said she really appreciated all the help you gave her over the years. It was really too much.

Good to hear, Will. There was a pause and clearing of the throat. Actually, I’m not your uncle, Will. He’s tied up right now, hee-hee; sort of like his yacht don’t you know. I’m Lester Vice, his First Mate, waterboy, et cetera. Sorry for the confusion.

Oh.

Call me Les—Les Vice.

It’s all right. I haven’t heard Uncle Rob’s voice for a long, long time. It’s okay.

Be right over. Sit tight.

An hour passed with no one showing up. I changed a dollar for sixty cents with a panhandler standing outside the terminal and called again.

Sure, hon. You got the right number. It’s me here. Everyone got the rest of the day off. She said something like the driver left a while ago and was definitely on his way. If I didn’t see him soon, I should start walking toward the beach.

But. Darn! She hanged up before I could ask if it was the beach at Ft. Lauderdale or St. Pete. I no option but to find my way oceanside. I jetissoned a few paperbacks and magazines and hoisted the backpack for the long walk. After half an hour, I stopped to make another phone call. How could they identify me in the first place? This didn’t make any damned sense.

Uh, Mr. Melville, this recording is for you. Sorry about the delay. Please be patient. When you get to the intersection with S&M Bootery on the corner, turn East toward the water. You’re real close now. The car broke down and we sent out another for you. Don’t worry. You can count on your uncle.

Yeah, but how the hell does he know what I even look like?

As I strained my eyes through a small canyon of shops, someone tapped me on the shoulder. Will?

I turned around. Vinnie! What the!

Will? What on earth are you doing here? Damn, Samuel!

I was stunned. We exchanged harmless gestures and anthropoid grunts, then sat down in a snack bar where a crouching police cruiser on the corner was obscured by the derangement of huge hanging baskets of plastic wisteria in front of a hobby store.

Hey, Vinnie Pugliese. I can’t believe you’re here. What’s witchoo, pal? Youse don’t have to answer.

Cut the phoney routine. I ain’t, and don’t tell anyone you saw me. Right?

Sure sure. I thought you were ready for your cap and gown.

"Yeah, I did finally graduate, but the party’s over. I’m subrosa, incognito, persona non grata and the rest of that Latin bull.

Why? I noticed how he left out tabula rasa. I’ll never know how he graduated. I knew he and the others I used to drink beer with at the Quad Club discussed the options after school, from enlisting in the service to skipping the country.⁸

I can’t handle it, pal. Want some more fries?

No thanks, but your old man’s money can easily get you into law school. Right?

I thought about it. I’m tired of this book routine. Feel like I’m out of touch on life support.

He brushed his coal-black hair back behind his ears and asked what the hell I was doing here. Eventhough we were peers, I dropped my head long enough for him to answer his own question.

You, too, huh? Welcome to the thirty-day club.

I acknowledged the answer with a half-smile, embarrassed that after a 1300-mile bus ride to anonymity, I’d bump into an authority on my identity. He fidgeted with the napkin holder and seemed for an instant to be the loneliest person this side of Aldebaran.

Why the hell do I want to wait? How long do you think a polysci major will survive with all those gung-ho politicians running the show? Listen, Will. Again, he peeked over his shoulder at the ordinary movement of cars lined up at the take-out window. Why don’t you come with me to Copenhagen. Maybe we can lay low with Lola Lindqvist. Remember her? I’m leaving tomorrow morning. The old man left me a ton of money. Sometimes it pays to be an only child.

Don’t remind me.

Sorry, Will.

I could see a sheen of despair in his eyes. A plea for companionship; the old collegiate camaraderie in a cold foreign harbor.

Vinnie, I can’t. Thanks. I’d really like to, but my uncle asked me down here. So, I’m here. He’s got something lined up for me. I don’t even know what the hell it is.

Vinnie asked me are you sure three times in a minute. T’was a sad-ass day in hell when my old friend with whom I stole candy at the five-and-dime; delivered half the Post-Gazette into the sewer at Third Ave. and Grand; and double-dated the Swenson girls would soon become totally lost in the crowd for reasons irrational and beyond our youthful control.

No sweat, Will. I understand. Youth is dead, Will. Long live wasted youth! He tried to smile and raised a hand holding an imaginary beer stein.

Then out of nowhere, a woman with large sunglasses almost as large as her breasts walked up to our booth. Her voluptuous figure strained to escape her lime-green limbo pantsuit. Vinnie and I were caught in mid-sentence. She had an elusive scent of excitement and a smile making the white of her perfect teeth leap from her mouth like the surf at Ocean City. For an instant I felt like chum trailing a boat of drunken fishermen, waiting with joy to sacrifice myself for a few seconds to be nudged, nibbled and swallowed whole.

Mr. Melville, I presume. Her legs were spread apart on spikey high heels, and I expected her to raise her lithe arms like a Broadway chorus line tryout. Vinnie became quite upset and almost slipped out of his seat to say are you looking for me, too?

She removed with care her tortoise-shell blueblockers and placed them on the table. They were genuine Seamus Favioli’s. No need to worry. I’m not one of those under-the-cover types, if you get what I mean.

Her bright blue eyes (or tinted contact lenses) darted up and down my length with such familiarity I sensed she stripped off my clothes. I’m here to pick you up, Mr. Melville. Sorry to be so late.

Finally, I breathed. I thought you’d never come.

She tossed me a surprised glance and declared in a drawl, I always come on time, given the appropriate setting and circumstances. Then she glanced at her thick PanAmazonis chronometer and threw me a phrase wrapped in the purest possible innocence from her mango-frosted lipstick. Well, are you ready to come with me, or do you need some time? I’ll wait outside.

Vin seemed already halfway up to Boston-Logan for his connecting flight. Although this driver from Uncle was an abrupt, if not unpleasant intrusion, the whole scene gave me the uncomfortable feeling of sinister events on the horizon. Any way, I was too tired to dwell on it. Outside, it was getting dark. Vinnie and I hugged each other and gave one another a gentle punch on the bicep like we used to do at Mundane.

Gotta get to the airport. I’ll sleep there tonight. Might be good practice.

Don’t say that, I said. You’ll be all right, Vin.

Keep in touch!

Yo!

I hopped into a red Ferrari and off we went into hyperspace at 0-60 in 3.7 seconds. She reacquired lawful entry after three miles and smiled at me across the gear box.

So you’re his nephew. You must be proud of you uncle.

"Yes. I’ve heard some great things about him, but I’ve never chanced to meet him since early childhood.

You poor boy. You need to be brought up to date. She tossed me a newspaper photo with the caption, Robert Melville presents local Charitable Union with $20000 check. He’s a wonderful, intelligent and giving and caring individual. You’ll see. He’s very influential. She tossed her head up at the traffic light and said, So, what have you done lately?"

Huh?

You know. How many badges earned?

In the Boy Scouts?

No. Hitler Jugend.

I said I don’t follow you and wish you would slow down. No sooner had I spoken than a police cruiser pulled us over. The trooper strode up to the car.

Ma’am, what were you doing going 135 in a 50 zone? She reached up for her sunglasses.

The officer reached up for his reflective pilot sunglasses.

She pulled her sunglasses down to the tip of her nose. He quickly pulled his sunglasses down and off his ski-jump nose and dangled them in front of her. I figured he wasn’t about to be framed for doing his job.

But officer, it was only for ten blocks and no one got hurt.

He lifted an eyebrow and apologized. Oh, sorry Dr. Francesca. Do you need an escort?

She handed him a small pink envelope, thanked him and waved as he moved on into traffic at an alarming rate of speed doing his job.

How did you do that? I said.

I told you. Your uncle knows everybody here and he takes care of everybody.

I was impressed, but also curious how someone could get away with this blatant traffic violation. She glanced at my consternation and shook her head. Listen, Mr. Melville, so we broke the law. Nobody was hurt. I paid tribute and so what’s the problem? Laws are made to be broken, then fixed ad nauseum. Are you familiar with case law?

I could have been sitting in a VW bug far behind her dust for all I knew. She was not only intelligent, but hyperbolically attractive at ninety degrees. Several miles flew by and we stopped at a little grotto-styled restaurant.

Good evening, Dr. Francesca. Your usual place? said the solicitous Bassett hound.

We sat down in a booth. I stole a sideways glance at her and thought about rockclimbing.

Some thirty minutes later and two glasses of wine, I found out her name was Debbie Costello. Her professional name: Violetta Francesca. What the devil was she running away from? Abuse? Explosive IQ? There was a Costello residence several blocks away from our house, but there’s a lot of Costellos out there, so why should I get personal? She twirled her wine glass on the scale of a micrometer with precision and thoughtfulness which I felt expressed a certain deference toward me.

You could say Lester Vice—Les—is your uncle’s right-hand man. When he’s ashore here, I massage his hemispheres to make sure he has his head on straight.

I could imagine which head, but I had a hard time understanding her. I canted my own head politely as if I knew this stuff for years. Dr. Francesca was only seven years older, but the vivacious lilt of her voice and luscious precision of vowel and dipthong overwhelmed my youthful senses, and I feebly toyed with the tumescent desire to schuss downhill between the gates of her twin peaks into the moist valley below for an edifying apres-ski.⁹

She glanced at her diver’s chronometer. Nice to meet you. Got to run. Don’t worry. Remember, it’s only a shakedown cruise. I’m supposed to stay behind on this one.

But. Behind? I wanted to rear-end her like a horny hermit shepherd with a learner’s permit. I sat there rather stunned although relaxed in the spongy chintz-covered chair. What in the hell did I get myself into? Back in Monroe in my attic room with the wall of pennants from Penn State, Mundane, Indiana and U of M, I thought the first step to leave home and a sense of independence was to hop on the local bus and knock on doors for a job. Now I entered a strange clockwork of time and motion waiting with grinding gears to comminute me into choice hamburger over there or impress me into the infamous anonymity of a draft dodger. It almost didn’t matter to me now, floating in flotsam full of cruise ship garbage with no conscience or purpose beyond providing sustenance for lower forms.¹⁰ After a while, I went to the men’s room and tried not to urinate on the seat. At least I was sitting down this time in a halfway decent restaurant.

The maitre d’ came to my table and said, So very sorry, sir. This is for you. He handed me a torn corner of the day’s menu.

I muttered this is getting to be a real ball of yarn as I mused at the directions to walk five blocks south along the avenue and wait at the flashing yellow light. It said, You’re nearly there! I really appreciated the exclamation mark. Obviously, this was a sort of crude game and I began to resent my own naivete more than my uncle’s cryptic messages. I yelled SON-OF-A-BITCH! to no one in particular. One of the waiters came out to flick a cigarette across my path to the No Parking sign. I moved on under the dubious stare of the sun and a panel of lesser deities. No sooner did I trudge to the appointed traffic light than a Renault Dauphine pulled up.

Senor Will, si?

Si, si. And I threw in ja, da, oui, hai and jambo in quick succession in this bonus round.

Your uncle is around the corner and waiting to see you.

No kidding!

Que?

Es verdad, no? I recalled from my fifty-word Spanish lexicon.

Yes. No boolsheet, he chuckled. Get in. My name is Aurelio from Manaus. You heard of Amazon, no?

Sure. We’re going there?

He gave a hearty laugh, then in an instant frowned as he peeked over the steering wheel at the fuzzy dice dangling from the rearview mirror. He pushed down his collar a bit and pointed to an intricate tribal tattoo snaking down his neck. "This here is my identity papers. Passport. When I’m back home. I can go anywhere there. Up here, it’s only to impress las chicas—the girls.

And I guess you also work for Uncle Rob.

"Oh, man. El Capitan. He numero uno. Mas grande jefe. He save my life.¹¹

Aurelio, who told me he only worked for uncle on the Intracoastal Waterway, grinned and turned into a parking lot next to a dance club called La Cabana.

You go inside now, okay? he said in a flat sinister monotone without making the usual throat-cutting sign with his finger. Boss orders. Wait. No te—don’t worry. Maybe boss get angry. He gave me a primal stare from deep in the arboreal past of his jungle ancestors. It sobered me up and I did not object like some wise-ass sophomore on Spring break.

Exhausted, angry and hungry, there was no choice but to enter the club and wait for the next series of broken promises. A perky, gum-clicking waitress slipped an arm into mine.

Wadashuggawon, hon? She noticed my slight frown and straightened her apron.

How about two ham sandwiches and a Heineken?

Hon, we do the sandwich thing, but we don’t serve foreign stuff here. Only Bud or Dos Equis.

Finally, I was ready to break the ten-hour chain of peanuts and peppermint patties with some real food, and settled back to wait and watch several older couples do a halting baby-step version of the meringue. I told the skinny waitress to keep the three dollar bills. She tucked them between her hills of Rome, as we used to say about Arlene Fazio’s admirable pulcritude in Ann Arbor.

Listen, hon, you need a place to stay tonight?

Her hand felt good on my knee. Maybe. I’m waiting for someone to pick me up.

So. She waited for me to complete the sentence. Who you waiting for—you girlfriend?

No. My uncle, Robert Melville. Seems like a lot of people around here know about him.

Oh, so you the guy. Wait here, hon. Then she got up rather fast and weaved through the dance floor and disappeared.

Right. I’ll wait here until hell melts the arctic icecap. Several minutes later she sneaked in beyond my peripheral vision with two beers. It’s my break time, hon. She patted my hand with surprising tenderness, and her apron didn’t reek of onions and garlic anymore.

Hon, watch now. I told them to play Maria Elena. You watch, okay? She tilted her beach blond curls toward the parquet dance floor.

I waited, as usual. Then from the shadows a little old man searched the middle of the dance floor with a halting gait. He wore a black velvet cape cloaking his small frame of about five feet five. His black shoes with risers glistened. Then I saw his face for an instant under the roving overhead spotlight. A neat white mustache under a prominent well-shaped Cervantian nose between two well-inked black eyebrows lifted in the air as he unfastened his cape and tossed it onto the bar like a bullfighter. He lifted the proud head with thinning, swept-back white hair and held out a hand beckoning a partner, but no one came out from the shadows. Strangely, I didn’t feel so alone. He waited. He held up his arms to receive the one he came for.

His wife she dead for many years now, the waitress whispered in my ear.

He caressed the air, waiting for the beat. He embraced the empty space with great care, holding his hand where the small of a woman’s back would be; where the zipper might be. He began right on the downbeat a deliberate slow foxtrot box complete with an ad-lib sensuous dip and bend as he swept across the floor with his beloved airspace. What a gentleman and dancer! This nostalgic pantomime lasted only about three minutes. When the music ended, he extended his arm again with a gallant flourish to release her memory. She lingered in my memory, and I also didn’t want her to go. Slowly, he went to the bar, where his cape hung half over it. You see photograph over there behind bar. His wife. He come here every Saturday night to dance one dance with her. He don’t fool round.

What’s his name?

He don’t like to talk.

The old man dropped a few coins onto the bar and, with the regal ambiguity of someone down to his last dime and a Lamborghini idling outside, strode with his chin up and chest out across the dark dance floor to resume his seat in the purple shadows.

Where does he come from? He must live around here somewhere.

He been coming here for cupola years. What I hear he scape from Catro in 1960. You see, viejo over there he got no worries; only memories. You know what I mean?¹²

I shook my head in agreement. I glanced at the hem of her short skirt. I was the novitiate here, trying to fathom the mystical way through the throng at the door waiting to get in. When I glanced back to the table after scanning the crowd for younger women, the guy’s face was partially obscured by the white Panama hat set at a rackish angle, almost like the old man’s. He got up and halfway across the floor, stopped and stared right at me.

I said, hell, here’s another messenger. This is getting to be a real pain in the ass, I said to no one in particular, least of all myself. I stared back at him, with the hat rim glowing like a halo better-suited to a Botticelli painting. On my third beer, I recalled an old photograph of Uncle Rob at Bear Lake with a sardonic half-smile as if he were at once a most charitable and kind person and then someone else who was reclusive, cut corners, schemed, cheated and did any kind of dastardly thing imaginable to get ahead. And then this guy stretched out his arms in a generous sweep and got into my space. The irridescent tattoo of a dolphin decorated the back of his right hand.

Will, don’t you know me, he shouted above the crowd and shuffling feet.¹³

"Uncle Rob? Uncle Rob! Finally! And I jumped out of my skin and got up and hugged him right smack in the middle of a reticulated conga line ready to constrict the two of us. I coughed and wanted to weep from exhaustion on the shoulder of my father’s brother and surrogate. He let out a great burst of laughter from a neat scruff of white beard at the entrance to a generous mouth of capped teeth as white as the cliffs of Dover. I don’t know why, but I wandered back to Dr. Debbie in a flash and wondered how long would it take a ripple from the English Channel to pounce upon the beach at Ocean City and rush up past sand castles to lick her oily legs. Probably never, but at least my uncle finally showed up.

My boy, let me get a look at you. My word, you’ve grown up since I last saw you what was it fifteen years ago you were a tyke. Hell, I can’t remember I’ve been so busy.

I brushed away moisture from my eyes. The search was over. I couldn’t remember ever meeting him face-to-face. Only from a snapshot and handful of family photos at oblique angles with the old Kodak Enigmatic Mom sometimes pulled out of the hall closet. I was four or five. The only true link to my father, whom I also never met. His features close-up were elusive, but I focused on the brooding wrinkled brow, searching eyes and sloping shoulders.

Uncle Rob. Jesus!

No, Will. Just Uncle Rob here, as he placed his hands on my shoulders in a second wave of greeting. Come on, get your drink and let’s take a seat back over there where I hang out when I’m here. I can’t get over it. Ha!

On the way over, he broke into the line, grabbed my hands and planted them right on the rotating hips of a babe in short pink pants who turned to me and shouted let’s tighten it up. Uncle Rob jumped in front of her and we spent ten minutes snaking our way around to the other side. Yet another diversion, though fully acceptable this time.

Thanks, doll, he said to the girl sandwiched in between us.

My pleasure, captain, she cheered.

At the table, I asked out of breath if he knew the girl.

Oh, yeah. She was a summer intern for me two years ago. Very nice girl. She’s taking a break from Gainesville.

Really? What does she do?

Cultural anthroapologist studying headhunters in New Guinea, he winked.

What? The music is too loud.

I’ll introduce you to her some time. Gaby, a pitcher of beer please, he shouted at the racing waitress. Several minutes later, he rotated his glass a few times and burped in my direction. The dim light was still bright enough to show the spidery skin accented by the residue of some dark oily substance. Soiled hands crossed my mind, but then again, Mom said he got into everything.

Well, tell me now, as he faked an Irish brogue. How is it you took so long in getting here? He winked again.

The waitress at the end glanced our way, swung her head in silent dismay as if to say watch your step.

I was so damned grateful Uncle Rob showed up, it slipped my mind he was the stage manager responsible for my getting jerked around for four hours like some errant teenager booked for possession; so close to the beach of screaming girls in bikinis under bright umbrellas, yet so far away; four hours of nonsense and teasing; I was ready to get back on Poussy’s Greyhound for a roundtrip back home and a one hundred percent certainty of going to basic training and ninety percent chance of going to Vietnam and then fifty percent chance of occupying a black body bag and twenty percent chance of getting buried within the national cemetery of Mom’s choice and then back up to one hundred percent chance of never munching buttered popcorn at a rerun of Odd Man Out with my hand palming Daphne Milloy’s plump left